Battlefield 1942 PC Review

First come the massive single player games Medal of Honor and now comes the massively multiplayer game Battlefield 1942 from the same developers. A nice new concept on WW2 gaming, capture the flag style.

The style of Battlefield 1942 is to capture all the flags on the map to make the enemies amount of “tickets”, or lives, drop. Another way to do this is to just kill the enemy. There are two teams – Allies and Axis (Nazis, Japanese etc.) and one objective – win.

A nice new graphics engine runs BF1942 and does the job well, trees are nicely detailed, tanks look menacing and rockets are devilish. The graphics engine, made by Dice, gives WW2 the “dirty” feeling of war. This engine also runs a new rally game from Microsoft.

BF1942 is aimed at multiplayer, and is useless single player as the game is the same, just no human players to kill – only stupid AI. So my brother and I play over LAN. Now, our computers aren’t that good here in “LAN land”, so we can only have 10 AI people and 2 humans playing, but it’s good all the same. We go in co-operative mode where AI are available, and get into Operation Market Garden, which WASN’T in 1942 (along with Omaha Beach). My brother decides to fly the planes, whilst I go in on foot. As I paradrop into the battlefield I look around at the Nazis and Allies sprawling around on the ground below, tanks and men tussle together and missiles fly. As I hit the ground an explosion rocks the ground near me as a friendly tank is lost, luckily I chose the role of Medic (others are Assault, Engineer, Anti-tank and Scout) and could heal myself. I then drew my Tommy gun and stayed low as I ran along a ditch to a flag point with two AI assault men, as we got there the AI ran up to capture the flag, and I couldn’t help but sit back and realise how real this game is. The AI are really clever and sure know how to kick ass.

After that flag was captured, my assault guys and I had to hold off a small bridge as Nazis decided to take our flag. I rattled off my rounds at the men until, out of the fog, came a bad thing… a tank. The AI both armed their grenades and ran forwards, throwing them at the tank. I stayed back because I am not that stupid, but miraculously they killed the tank! Until one of their rogue grenades blew them both up… shame. Luckily you respawn like any multiplayer game. As I went to heal my brother, who had just ejected and decided to parachute into the river, we stuck together and got a half-track. I was gunner, we mowed down loads of enemies here – what fun!

Battlefield really takes you into WW2, much like Medal of Honor, only this time you can choose your role, hide in buildings, fight it out, drive ships, pilot planes, dive in a submarine, blow things up with a tank, race across land with a jeep, swim, snipe, heal, steal enemy vehicles, capture flags, and generally kick some enemy ass. A hit for any multiplayer gaming fanatic.

Summary:

Graphics
Nice and dirty, realistic and rough.

Gameplay
Lack of single player campaign originality, but GREAT multiplayer!

Sound
You can now hear gunshots from a distant battle, so you know what’s goin’ on.

Lifespan
Different every time. With the forthcoming “Road to Rome” expansion this should be even better!

Overall
A classic multiplayer game, original too – who would’ve thought of a WW2 multiplayer?

9 out of 10